School Backs Down from Ban on American Celebration After Protests

It seems to me that a public school administrator got caught with his hand in the multicultural cookie jar.

While the school should be commended for doing the right thing and allowing students to celebrate America, whoever would have thought that American teenagers would be treated as second-class citizens in their own country?

And that’s why Sheriff Smith was standing in the bitter cold, waving his American flag – the one that normally flew outside his home.

“We can’t and we won’t stand for that kind of attitude in our schools,” Sheriff Smith told me in a telephone interview. “It’s our country. They’re our community schools. We will take them back and restore the values – the ones that made America the great nation it is today.”

“I realized I could not just sit on the sidelines,” he said. “I had to stand up and do something.”
Within minutes, he was joined by a dozen others – an uprising of patriots sick and tired of the anti-American venom spewing from public school administrators.

“This is really a sign of root problems we have,” he said. “A lot of us understand -- this anti-American sentiment has poisoned our schools – the ideas and beliefs that are preached to them.”

A sort of grassroots protest movement unfolded early Tuesday on KCOL, the local news radio station that carries my daily commentary. Callers unleashed their fury over the airwaves. Students from the high school emailed passionate messages.

Among them, was a young man – a tenth grader who asked not to be identified.

“I'm personally outraged at the school that we can celebrate every other culture but our own,” this young American teenager wrote. “We have activities that go on during Cinco de Mayo but we can't celebrate and honor our own country [where] we live I'm very angry.”

As Sheriff Smith and his frozen band of patriots waved their flags, drivers honked their horns, bus drivers waved and students stopped to watch.

“It was important to send a message to students,” the sheriff said. “They needed to know they are not alone and that they did the right thing by standing up. I hope when they and their parents saw their sheriff standing out in front of the school – they knew they weren’t alone.”

The sheriff is correct. These brave young men and women are not alone.

We are compelled to stand alongside our fellow countrymen at Fort Collins High School.

Patriotism must never be sacrificed on the altar of political correctness.

“This is a wake up call,” Sheriff Smith said. “We’ve been given the blessing of a wake up call as to what is going on (in our school). Now the question is -- what do we do about it?”

Todd Starnes is the host of Fox News & Commentary – heard daily on 250+ radio stations. He’s also the author of “Dispatches From Bitter America.” To check out all of his work you can visit his website or follow him on Twitter @toddstarnes. In his spare time, Todd is active in his church, plays golf, follows SEC football, and eats barbecue. He lives in New York City.